The desire for more space is a tale as old as time, but for a couple in New York it wasn’t just about adding room so much as how these rooms will be used in the future. Keith Burns Architect applied the client’s desired flexibility to their 1950s, 2-story, split-level townhouse in East Williamsburg. For Cooper Park Townhouse, the architects carefully choreographed a single-level addition with a terrace, an art studio that could one day be converted to a kitchen, and a standalone apartment in the former crawl space—all while the clients can continue living in the above levels.
“The project is very tactical,” said founder Keith Burns. “We didn’t touch anything from the entry level up, but effectively built a whole new apartment right underneath it while [the clients] lived in it.” The ground-floor addition maximizes how much of the rear garden the building was allowed to take up. This addition serves as an art studio for one of the clients while also creating a space for an outdoor terrace as a way to offer exterior space back to the clients.
The art studio itself acts like a blank canvas for the client. White walls, concrete floors, wooden accents and work desks, and track lighting create a functional, sparse studio. It’s warmed up by the artwork itself and a plethora of natural light, courtesy of the new floor-to-ceiling windows and a walkable skylight overhead, placed on the terrace.
But as the clients get older, they want the option to live in an accessible unit which informs the design of both the renovated crawl space and art studio. To accommodate one day turning the ground floor into a full apartment unit, the art studio is designed to easily become a kitchen and living room. All the necessary outlets and electrical and plumbing needs are already in place to house a kitchen. “We already planned where the kitchen could lay out so that they could just drop a kitchen,” said Burns. “We left the studio a little bit raw, a blank slate, so if it got turned over into a living room or kitchen, you weren’t ripping stuff out; it would be more additive to the palette.”
A hallway connects the studio to the former crawl space, which the architects excavated to provide full height space. The area now houses a bedroom and bathroom which the clients can use to occasionally rent out or to house guests, but in the future can easily be converted to a full apartment unit. As opposed to the raw material and color palette of the rear art studio, the front space is warm and cozy.
The bedroom is dominated by walnut wood with a headboard that stretches from wall to wall. In the bathroom, gray tiles clad the interior in varying textures and patterns. “Everything here is intended to be like cozy nesting and that ties to the fact that you are below grade, or at least half below grade. So it’s a space that you’re encapsulated,” continued Burns.
A basement-level space could easily feel dark and gloomy, but the designers smartly add light via the new, glass entrance to the bedroom. A carved-out doorway is covered in green tiles, introducing the new bedroom with warmth and texture. It’s also planted to add to this feeling. In place of clerestory windows, now the glass door is able to provide fuller natural light. The designers’s two-for-one move is part and parcel of their deft maneuvering of the project.